At last, I can retire and give up this life of crime...

Fri, 25 Sep 2009 05:00:50 GMT

I got my semi-annual superannuation statement today. It seems my plans to buy a small island in the Galapagos and evolve into a previously unseen species of finch will have to go on hold for awhile...

Never as good as the first time...

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 13:52:47 GMT

I knew this would happen one day, I just didn't think it would be today. With this, I join the vast, unwashed ranks of those who 'only joined to reply to other posts' <sigh> Lets see if anyone is listening...

I've been wondering, if you come across a fantastic story idea on Wikipedia, is it safe to assume that someone else has already had it, wrote it and sold it? Awhile ago, I was pottering around the web, trying to find out whether the word 'lycan' was Latin or Greek based (someone asked about it but I've forgotten the exact details). This led to the wikipedia entry for 'lycanthropy', in which I stumbled across the real life story of a man called Thiess, an 80-year old self-confessed werewolf who was brought to trial in Livonia in 1698, where he claimed that werewolves were not evil, but actually fought against witches for the benefit of humanity. Does any of this sound familiar to anyone?

I set the idea aside, assuming that if it had found it way to Wikipedia, someone must have already used it. But the story that I've been working on through the uni holidays seems to have broken down completely so today I started work on a draft based on accounts of Thiess' trial (I have broadened my research somewhat beyond Wikipedia at this point). I know that different writers can take radically different approaches to the exact same story, and that's not a problem per se but I think there's a certain shock value to knowing that the story is actually based in reality, but that's not going to work if it's already been done three dozen times!!!

Any thoughts?

Hendo

At last, I can retire and give up this life of crime...

Never as good as the first time...